Act 1 — [Scene I.][1371]

Sab. Hail, Caius Silius![1372] Sil. Titius Sabinus,[1373] hail! You’re rarely met in court. Sab. Therefore, well met. Sil.’T is true: indeed, this place is not our sphere. Sab. No, Silius, we are no good inginers.[1374] We want the fine arts, and their thriving use5 Should make us grac’d, or favour’d of the times: We have no shift of faces, no cleft tongues, No soft and glutinous bodies, that can stick, Like snails, on painted walls; or, on our breasts, Creep up, to fall from that proud height, to which10 We did by slavery,[1375] not by service climb. We are no guilty men, and then no great; We have nor place in court, office in state, That we can say,[1376] we owe unto our crimes: We burn with no black secrets,[1377] which can make15 Us dear to the pale authors; or live fear’d Of their still waking jealousies, to raise Ourselves a fortune, by subverting theirs. We stand not in the lines, that do advance To that so courted point.

Sil. But yonder lean20 A pair that do. Sab.[salutes Latiaris.] Good cousin Latiaris.[1378] Sil. Satrius Secundus,[1379] and Pinnarius Natta,[1380] The great Sejanus’ clients: there be two, Know more than honest counsels; whose close[1381] breasts,24 Were they ripp’d up to light, it would be found A poor and idle[1382] sin to which their trunks Had not been made fit organs. These can lie, Flatter, and swear, forswear,[1383] deprave, inform, Smile, and betray; make guilty men; then beg The forfeit lives, to get their livings; cut30 Men’s throats with whisp’rings; sell to gaping suitors The empty smoke that flies about the palace; Laugh when their patron laughs; sweat when he sweats; Be hot and cold with him; change every mood, Habit, and garb, as often as he varies;35 Observe him, as his watch observes his clock;[1384] And, true as turquoise in the dear lord’s ring,[1385] Look well or ill with him:[1386] ready to praise His lordship, if he spit, or but piss fair,39 Have an indifferent stool, or break wind well; Nothing can scape their catch. Sab. Alas! these things Deserve no note, conferr’d[1387] with other vile And filthier flatteries,[1388] that corrupt the times, When, not alone our gentries chief are fain To make their safety from such sordid acts,45 But all our consuls,[1389] and no little part Of such as have been praetors, yea, the most Of senators,[1390] that else not use their voices, Start up in public senate, and there strive Who shall propound most abject things, and base;50 So much, as oft Tiberius hath been heard, Leaving the court, to cry,[1391] O race of men, Prepar’d for servitude!—which show’d that he, Who least the public liberty could like, As loathly brook’d their flat servility.55 Sil. Well, all is worthy of us, were it more, Who with our riots, pride, and civil hate, Have so provok’d the justice of the gods: We, that, within these fourscore years, were born Free, equal lords of the triumphed world,60 And knew no masters but affections; To which betraying first our liberties, We since became the slaves to one man’s lusts; And now to many:[1392] every minist’ring spy That will accuse and swear, is lord of you,65 Of me, of all, our fortunes and our lives. Our looks are call’d to question,[1393] and our words, How innocent soever, are made crimes; We shall not shortly dare to tell our dreams, Or think, but ’t will be treason. Sab. Tyrants’ arts70 Are to give flatterers grace; accusers, power; That those may seem to kill whom they devour. [Enter Cordus and Arruntius.] Now, good Cremutius Cordus.[1394] Cor. [salutes Sabinus.] Hail to your lordship! Nat. Who ’s that salutes your cousin? Lat. ’T is one Cordus. They whisper. A gentleman of Rome: one that has writ75 Annals of late, they say, and very well. Nat. Annals? Of what times? Lat. I think of Pompey’s,[1395] And Caius Caesar’s; and so down to these. Nat. How stands he affected to the present state? Is he or Drusian,[1396] or Germanican,80 Or ours, or neutral? Lat. I know him not so far. Nat. Those times are somewhat queasy[1397] to be toucht. Have you or seen or heard part of his work? Lat. Not I; he means they shall be public shortly. Nat. O, Cordus do you call him? Lat. Ay. [Exeunt Natta and Satrius.] Sab. But these our times85 Are not the same, Arruntius.[1398] Arr. Times! The men, The men are not the same! ’T is we are base, Poor, and degenerate from th’ exalted strain Of our great fathers. Where is now the soul Of god-like Cato? he, that durst be good,90 When Caesar durst be evil; and had power, As not to live his slave, to die his master? Or where’s the constant Brutus, that being proof Against all charm of benefits, did strike So brave a blow into the monster’s heart95 That sought unkindly[1399] to captive his country? O, they are fled the light! Those mighty spirits Lie rak’d up with their ashes in their urns, And not a spark of their eternal fire Glows in a present bosom. All’s but blaze,100 Flashes, and smoke, wherewith we labour so; There’s nothing Roman in us; nothing good, Gallant, or great. ’T is true that Cordus says, “Brave Cassius was the last of all that race.”

Sab. Stand by! Lord Drusus.[1400] Hat. Th’ emp’ror’s son! Give place,105 Sil. I like the prince well. Arr. A riotous youth,[1401] There’s little hope of him. Sab. That fault his age Will, as it grows, correct. Methinks he bears Himself each day more nobly than other; And wins no less on men’s affections,110 Than doth his father lose. Believe me, I love him; And chiefly for opposing to Sejanus.[1402] Sil. And I, for gracing his young kinsmen so,[1403] The sons[1404] of prince Germanicus:[1405] it shows A gallant clearness in him, a straight mind,115 That envies not, in them, their father’s name. Arr. His name was, while he liv’d, above all envy; And, being dead, without it. O, that man! If there were seeds of the old virtue left,119 They liv’d in him. Sil. He had the fruits, Arruntius, More than the seeds:[1406] Sabinus and myself Had means to know him within; and can report him. We were his followers, he would call us friends; He was a man most like to virtue; in all, And every action, nearer to the gods125 Than men, in nature; of a body as fair As was his mind; and no less reverend In face than fame:[1407] he could so use his state, Temp’ring his greatness with his gravity, As it avoided all self-love in him,130 And spite in others. What his funerals lack’d In images and pomp, they had suppli’d With honourable sorrow, soldiers’ sadness, A kind of silent mourning, such as men, Who know no tears but from their captives, use135 To show in so great losses. Cor. I thought once, Considering their forms, age, manner of deaths, The nearness of the places where they fell, T’ have parallel’d him with great Alexander: For both were of best feature, of high race,140 Year’d but to thirty, and, in foreign lands, By their own people alike made away. Sab. I know not, for his death, how you might wrest it: But, for his life, it did as much disdain Comparison with that voluptuous, rash,145 Giddy, and drunken Macedon’s, as mine Doth with my bondman’s. All the good in him, His valour, and his fortune, he made his; But he had other touches of late Romans,149 That more did speak him:[1408] Pompey’s dignity, The innocence of Cato, Caesar’s spirit, Wise Brutus’ temp’rance: and every virtue, Which, parted unto others, gave them name, Flow’d mixt in him. He was the soul of goodness; And all our praises of him are like streams155 Drawn from a spring, that still rise full, and leave The part remaining greatest. Arr. I am sure He was too great for us,[1409] and that they knew Who did remove him hence. Sab. When men grow fast Honour’d and lov’d, there is a trick in state,160 (Which jealous princes never fail to use) How to decline that growth, with fair pretext, And honourable colours of employment, Either by embassy, the war, or such, To shift them forth into another air,165 Where they may purge, and lessen; so was he:[1410] And had his seconds there, sent by Tiberius And his more subtile dam, to discontent him; To breed and cherish mutinies; detract His greatest actions; give audacious check170 To his commands; and work to put him out In open act of treason. All which snares When his wise cares prevented,[1411] a fine poison Was thought on, to mature their practices. Cor. Here comes Sejanus.[1412] Sil. Now observe the stoops,175 The bendings, and the falls. Arr. Most creeping base!

Sej. I note ’em well: no more. Say you? Sat. My lord. There is a gentleman of Rome would buy—— Sej. How call you him you talk’d with? Sat. Please your worship, It is Eudemus,[1413] the physician180 To Livia, Drusus’ wife. Sej. On with your suit. Would buy, you said—— Sat. A tribune’s place, my lord. Sej. What will he give? Sat. Fifty sestertia.[1414] Sej. Livia’s physician, say you, is that fellow? Sat. It is, my lord. Your lordship’s answer? Sej. To what?185 Sat. The place, my lord. ’T is for a gentleman Your lordship will well like of, when you see him, And one that you may make yours, by the grant. Sej. Well, let him bring his money, and his name. Sat. Thank your lordship. He shall, my lord. Sej. Come hither.190 Know you this same Eudemus? Is he learn’d? Sat. Reputed so, my lord, and of deep practice. Sej. Bring him in to me, in the gallery; And take you cause to leave us there together: I would confer with him, about a grief.—On! [Exeunt Sejanus, Satrius, Terentius, etc.] Arr. So! yet another? yet? O desperate state195 Of grov’ling honour! Seest thou this, O sun, And do we see thee after? Methinks, day Should lose his light, when men do lose their shames, And for the empty circumstance of life,200 Betray their cause of living. Sil. Nothing so.[1415] Sejanus can repair, if Jove should ruin. He is the now court-god; and well applied With sacrifice of knees, of crooks, and cringe, He will do more than all the house of heav’n205 Can for a thousand hecatombs. ’T is he Makes us our day, or night; hell and elysium Are in his look. We talk of Rhadamanth, Furies, and firebrands; but ’t is his frown209 That is all these; where, on the adverse part, His smile is more than e’er yet poets feign’d Of bliss, and shades, nectar— Arr. A serving boy! I knew him, at Caius’[1416] trencher, when for hire He prostituted his abused body To that great gourmand, fat Apicius:215 And was the noted pathic[1417] of the time. Sab. And, now,[1418] the second face of the whole world! The partner of the empire, hath his image Rear’d equal with Tiberius, borne in ensigns; Commands, disposes every dignity.220 Centurions, tribunes, heads of provinces, Praetors, and consuls; all that heretofore Rome’s general suffrage gave, is now his sale. The gain, or rather spoil of all the earth, One, and his house, receives. Sil. He hath of late225 Made him a strength too, strangely, by reducing All the praetorian bands into one camp, Which he commands: pretending that the soldier, By living loose and scattered, fell to riot; And that if any sudden enterprise230 Should be attempted, their united strength Would be far more than sever’d; and their life More strict, if from the city more remov’d. Sab. Where now he builds what kind of forts he please, Is heard to court the soldier by his name,235 Woos, feasts the chiefest men of action, Whose wants, nor loves, compel them to be his. And though he ne’er were liberal by kind,[1419] Yet to his own dark ends, he’s most profuse, Lavish, and letting fly he cares not what240 To his ambition. Arr. Yet hath he ambition? Is there that step in state can make him higher, Or more, or anything he is, but less? Sil. Nothing but emp’ror. Arr. The name Tiberius, I hope, will keep, howe’er he hath foregone245 The dignity and power. Sil. Sure, while he lives. Arr. And dead, it comes to Drusus. Should he fail, To the brave issue of Germanicus; And they are three:[1420] too many—ha? for him To have a plot upon? Sil. I do not know250 The heart of his designs; but sure their face Looks farther than the present. Arr. By the gods, If I could guess he had but such a thought, My sword should cleave him down from head to heart, But I would find it out; and with my hand255 I’d hurl his panting brain about the air In mites as small as atomi t’ undo The knotted bed—— Sab. You are observ’d, Arruntius. Arr. (Turns to Sejanus’ clients.) Death! I dare tell him so; and all his spies. You, sir, I would, do you look? and you. Sab. Forbear.260